The idea of granting nature its own rights (or recognising them) is not entirely new. It raises fundamental questions about the relationship between humans and nature. These debates are gaining momentum both globally and in Germany. What exactly are 'Rights of Nature' and how can they be put into practice? What implications do they have for our connection to nature and legal systems? And where might conflicts or tensions emerge?
We have long since exceeded the planetary boundaries: the climate catastrophe is a reality, ecosystems and biodiversity sustained lasting damage, we are overexploiting soils, deforesting the land and overfishing the oceans, and microplastics can be found in every part of the planet. All of this has devastating consequences for the lives and health of humans, plants and animals, and is happening in the context of extreme social inequality and poverty.
For a long time it has been clear: to face these challenges, profound economical social, institutional and cultural changes are needed. The climate catastrophe and the massive loss of biodiversity are the most striking expression of massively disturbed human-nature relations in all parts of the world.
The ‘Rights of Nature’ are one of several responses to these challenges, with a potentially transformative impact on the relationship between humans and nature.
Around the world, a wide range of actors from the Global South and North are campaigning for this idea at local to global levels: representatives of indigenous peoples and activists, scientists, lawyers and judges. Their ‘clients’: rivers, mountain peaks and other ecosystems, from the Ecuadorian cloud forest to New Zealand's Whanganui River to the Mar Menor salt lagoon in the Spanish province of Murcia.
What are the 'Rights of Nature'?
The idea of recognising nature as a whole and non-human elements such as rivers, forests and various ecosystems as legal entities and thus ‘granting’ them rights is not new. Christopher Stone, US American legal scholar, argued in favour of it as early as the 1970s in his much-cited work ‘Should Trees Have Standing?’. The legal status of a ‘natural subject’ would create a symmetry of power and possibilities that does not currently exist in law.
Compared to existing environmental ethics and legislation, the Rights of Nature thus take it one step further: Within human legal systems, nature is recognised as a subject with intrinsic value and rights of its own. The Rights of Nature call into question no less than the anthropocentric world view, which regards humans as fundamentally separate from nature, considering nature a property as well as a resource to be exploited at human will – and to be protected (if at all) only due to its benefit to humans.
Treat nature as a person...
...and let ‘it’ go to court? To many, this idea seems absurd at first. However, major changes in jurisprudence – such as the abolition of slavery or the introduction of women’s suffrage – have always seemed utopian to contemporaries. They resulted from intense, long-term struggles. Moreover, if companies or even infants, not able to 'speak for themselves' either, have long been recognised as legal subjects and represented in courts, why not natural entities?
This is meant to counteract the existing, legally underpinned imbalance of power between human economic interests and the needs of natural ecosystems. A more effective legal lever is supposed to guarantee better protection of ecosystems – ‘on their own terms’ and doing justice to those who live closest to and with them: indigenous and local communities.
Upswing for a global movement
What may seem utopian at first is already legal practice in many countries around the world. Since the 2000s, the debate and practice has gained momentum again, this time initiated in Latin America: In 2008, Ecuador was the first country in the world to recognise the rights of „Nature, or ‚Pacha Mama‘“ in its constitution, followed by Bolivia in 2010 with its own legislation.
For decades, indigenous movements and politicians in particular had been campaigning in both countries to incorporate the Andean concept of a ‚living environment‘ ('Pacha Mama', often translated as ‘Mother Earth’) and the pursuit of 'Buen Vivir' (or 'sumak kawsay', ‘Good Life’) into the political and legal systems. These are based on a holistic world view, in which humans are seen as part of nature and all living beings as interconnected.
The current movement and debates on the Rights of Nature are therefore rooted in the efforts of progressive forces in the Global South and in indigenous cosmologies, which are being linked to legal concepts with origins in the West.
A decade and a half later, the Rights of Nature are legal practice in many countries, and actors around the world are campaigning for them at different levels – from local initiatives to recognise and protect individual ecosystems to transnational organisations such as the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature (GARN). With international commissions of enquiry and the International Rights of Nature Tribunals, GARN creates spaces to renegotiate environmental court cases on the grounds of the Rights of Nature and the so-called 'Earth Jurisprudence', giving voice to those affected. Since 2009, with the Harmony with Nature programme, the UN has been initiating dialogues and resolutions in this regard, led by indigenous actors, and countries such as Bolivia.
The Rights of Nature
Our relationship with nature is severely disrupted. To sustainably protect people and the environment, we need new approaches – such as granting rights to nature.
This article is part of the Rights of Nature dossier, which explores how this approach can be practically implemented and what opportunities it offers. ▶ Explore the Rights of Nature dossier.
Implementation
How are the Rights of Nature enshrined in legislation? What exactly should be recognised as a legal entity? And who is authorised to represent nature, in the courtroom and beyond? The concrete implementation and embedding of the Rights of Nature is subject to debates in civil society, politics and academia. Crucial requirements and frameworks include an independent judiciary, functioning national legislation and spaces for manoeuvre for civil society and parliaments. Issues and demands, implementations and forms of representation depend to a large extent on local actors and, above all, political, social and cultural contexts – thus, very human factors.
In 2017, the New Zealand Whanganui River (Māori: Te awa tupua) was declared a legal entity in a ground-breaking Settlement Act – as part of post-colonial conflict resolution and restitution processes between indigenous Māori and the New Zealand government. In Colombia, the Río Atrato was recognised as a legal entity in the context of violent conflicts over illegal mining and the endangered living conditions of local indigenous and Afro-American communities.
Meanwhile, the Rights of Nature have also arrived in Europe. After years of damage to the ecosystem, ecological and economic crises and a successful petition, Spain’s constitutional court confirmed the Mar Menor salt lagoon in the province of Murcia to be a ‘legal person’. However, the state of the ecosystem remains critical, and the consequences of this legislation are politically and socially contested.
Besides, the rights of rivers are at the centre of attention in many places in Europe, such as in the UK and France, where a variety of initiatives are working to protect local river ecosystems. In Germany, efforts are being made to amend legal texts at federal state level in the light of nature's rights, or indeed to ‘ecologise’ the country’s Basic Law.
Tensions and conditions
The Rights of Nature are not only in tension with a human anthropocentric world view and economic interests, but also with other jurisdictions, such as property rights and human rights.
Moreover, in order to effectively implement the Rights of Nature in a human-made system, it takes both people who demand these rights and the will to implement them, as well as political and legal systems in which they can unfold their full impact.
In other words, power relations are required, which allow, uphold and protect the rule of law, the separation of powers and the independence of courts. Around the globe, these conditions are becoming increasingly fragile: Scope for political action is shrinking or disappearing, political and environmental activists are in mortal danger in many places, opportunities to express political demands are being criminalised, while fundamental principles of the rule of law are being suspended.
In the midst of this situation, debates and campaigns for the Rights of Nature are in full swing. How can these rights be implemented, and where are they already a legal practice today? Who is standing up for them in which places? Who is supposed to speak for nature and why? What further questions and tensions arise? And what is needed for a productive debate on this idea today?
This online resource brings together contributions from international actors around the Rights of Nature, showcasing the diversity of approaches and potentials, introducing fundamental visions and debates, and presenting case studies on existing legal cases, as well as actors and ongoing initiatives.
Dossier Coordinators
Imke Horstmannshoff is a researcher, writer and activist for social-ecological change in Germany and the wider European context. Her work around the Rights of Nature includes networking, workshop organisation and facilitation, as well as the coordination of this online dossier. She currently researches Rights of Rivers in Western Europe in a PhD at University of Roehampton, London.
Barbara Unmüßig is a political scientist and publicist, and co-founder of numerous networks and organisations (German Institute for Human Rights, Forum Environment & Development). As a board member of Heinrich Boell Foundation (affiliated with the German Green Party), she has shaped the foundation's international and feminist work for over two decades until April 2022.
Literature & Links
- Kauffmann, C.M. & Martin, P.L. (2021). The Politics of Rights of Nature. Strategies for Building a More Sustainable Future. Massachusetts: MIT Press.
- Stone, C. D.: “Should Trees Have Standing? – Towards Legal Rights for Natural Objects.” Southern California Law Review 45 (1972): 450-501.
- Cullinan, C. (2002). Wild Law: A Manifesto for Earth Justice. Siber Ink & Green Books.
- Rights of Nature Tribunals
- Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature (GARN)
- ‘Rights of Nature Timeline’ of the US-based Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF)
- UN Harmony With Nature Programme
- Ecojurisprudence Monitor, collection of RoN jurisprudence around the world
